Some people can get this started at the funeral itself. I, for one, bring an entire box of tissues and a wastepaper basket. My crying isn't over with the end of the last hymn, but at least I have found some relief.

Others, for a variety of deeply personal reasons, may not cry at all, at first. But then something happens later on, sometimes even years later and the tears come.

This is perfectly normal.

I knew a man once, who didn't cry at his father's funeral. But when his granddaughter's beloved pet died and needed a decent burial, the floodgates opened.

At some point after the funeral, we enter the biggest and, in many ways, most difficult portion of the journey.

I call this phase "All of Life is Pointless".

You go back to your "normal" life, only to discover that "normal" no longer exists. Things that used to excite you, like earning a living, or communicating with people or, let's face it, basic hygiene, no longer hold your interest.

It's not depression, exactly. It's just the long, cold November of your grief. All you can do is hold on, knowing that what was important to you once may be important to you again.

Just try to maintain some sort of standing in that now-foreign country of "Normal Life" and trust that, eventually, you will come back, changed, as all travelers are, by your your experiences in Griefland.